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Rheumatoid Lung Lethal

If you have rheumatoid arthritis and shortness of breath, watch below …

Pulmonary Disease in Common RA, Lethal

Nancy Walsh writing on Medpage Today, patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) associated with interstitial lung disease (ILD) tend to have a distinct clinical presentation that includes advanced age, respiratory symptoms and worse RA in general – and are at substantial risk researchers reported.

44% of patients with interstitial lung abnormalities reported cough, compared to 21% with no abnormal findings on CT scan, while 47% versus 21% had difficulty breathing, according to Ivan Rosas, MD, of Harvard Medical School , and colleagues.

Affected patients also had higher levels of rheumatoid and more often were positive for anticyclic citrullinated peptide (CCP) antibodies, suggesting a more severe RA, the researchers reported in the journal Chest.

They were also older, with mean ages of 68 years compared to 53 among those without lung involvement.

Approximately one in ten RA patients has ILD. The risk of mortality in these patients is three times higher than in patients with RA without lung disease, and this risk increases even when overall RA mortality has decreased. The mean survival after diagnosis of this complication is only 2.6 years.